A classically-trained artist and ever-tempermental bachelor, Edgar Degas (1834-1917),
was one of the founders of Impressionism and is known for his paintings, sculptures,
pastels and prints of scenes of Parisian theatres, cafes, bordellos and intimate
domestic interiors. Born of French-Creole descent to a wealthy banking family, Degas
began studying art from the old master paintings in the Louvre at a young age. After
failing to complete law school and subsequently opting to attend the École des
Beaux-Arts instead, Degas began his career in the late-1850s with ambitions to be a
great history painter (which was the most highly regarded pursuit in the Paris Salon
at the time). He soon abandoned history painting as a result of being significantly
impacted after viewing the work of Manet, and instead began to produce paintings
depicting contemporary scenes of daily life. In the 1870s, he joined with Monet,
Cézanne, Pissarro, Morisot and others to form the Société Anonyme Coopérative des
Artistes Peintres, Sculpteurs et Graveurs and helped organize the first exhibition of
their works in the studio of the famed Parisian photographer Nadar at 35 Boulevard
des Capucines, Paris, which opened on April 15, 1874. This group of artists would later
become known as the Impressionists; Degas did not hide his distaste for this new
name he and his peers had been labelled, just as much as he voiced his opposition
to
en plein air
painting espoused by most members of the group. In regard to the
latter, he is quoted as saying, “Boredom soon overcomes me when I am
contemplating nature.” Throughout his career he considered himself a Realist, and
though he experimented with many different techniques and media, his strong
academic training remained readily apparent in his use of contours and attention to
drawing the human form.
In addition to his precision as a draughtsman, Degas’ unique manner of cropping his
compositions is particularly striking and said to have been influenced both by an
interest in contemporary Japanese
Ukiyo-e
woodcuts and in photography (though he
did not take up the medium in earnest until 1895). This focus on “shifting fields of
vision,” popular with Degas and other Impressionists, was explained in 1876 by critic
Edmond Duranty in his pamphlet on the recent Impressionist exhibition. In comparing
Degas’ approach to composition to looking through a window, Duranty said, “That the
window is the frame that endlessly accompanies us . . . cutting off the external view in
the most unexpected, changing ways, achieving the endless variety and surprise that
is one of realities great pleasures.” In keeping with this analogy, Degas’ compositions
often depict figures whose extremities are partially (and sometimes aggressively)
cropped out of the scene, capturing dynamic and unique slices of a moment in time.
Duranty’s window analogy pairs well with the voyeuristic quality of many of Degas’
paintings, drawings and prints, especially the intimate interiors of women washing or
ballet dancers dressing, notably the lithographic view of the woman at her toilette (lot
28). “Art is vice,” Degas once stated, “You don’t wed it, you rape it.”
Often considered a difficult personality and prone to misogynistic tendencies, Degas
ironically formed a close friendship with the American artist Mary Cassatt (lots 30
and 31) and served as her mentor for a time, though eventually his personality proved
too abrasive and she was forced to disassociate herself. Despite a problematic private
life, Degas remained an avid collector of old masters and modern art throughout his
career, collecting works by Ingres, Delacroix and Daumier as well as Gauguin and
others. Among the longest-lived Impressionists, he had the opportunity to witness
the coming art movements of the early 20th century and expressed esteem for the
Cubists stating that, “It seems even more difficult than painting.”
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